Essex spinner Simon Harmer is hoping the 2017 county champions can go and complete victory against Nottinghamshire at Trent Bridge on Thursday.

The South African recorded his best haul of the summer when taking 6-87 as the home side were dismissed for 337 in their second innings.

That took him past 50 wickets for the campaign and left Essex chasing 282 for victory.

And they will start the final day on 147-1 after debutant Murali Vijay (73 not out) and Tom Westley (45) shared an unbroken 130-run stand on Wednesday evening.

Harmer said: “I think it’s a wicket that looked like it suited the seamers but there was a lot of bounce and the turn was quite quick. It was nice to contribute because second innings wickets are always important.

“I think it was a superb little session for us (at the end of the day) from Murali Vijay and Tom (Westley). It was important that we minimised the damage and they did that and did extremely well.

“But there’s still a lot of cricket to be played and we’ve got to work really hard to get those 135 runs, so we hope to get stuck in and see it home.

“It’s an important game, every game is an important game and we don’t want to leave anything for the last couple of weeks of the season.”

Essex are set to host Worcestershire in their final home match of the season starting on Tuesday, before visiting champions-elect Surrey in their last fixture (September 24).